Part travelogue, part history, and part environmental treatise, "Mekong - The Occluding River" is above all else an urgent warning that factors such as pollution, ecological devastation, and the depletion of natural resources are threatening the very existence of the Mekong River. Author Ngo The Vinh combines his vivid travel notes and collection of photographs with a meticulously researched history of the environmental degradation of the Mekong River. Translated from Vietnamese, the best-selling treatise outlines the myriad threats facing the river today. From oil shipments feeding the industrial cities of southwestern China to gigantic hydroelectric dams known as the Mekong Cascades in Yunnan province, China is the worst environmental offender, though the other nations along Mekong's banks behave no better. From Thailand to Laos to Vietnam, hydroelectric dams that threaten the Mekong and its inhabitants are being built at an alarming rate. To save the Mekong, Ngo The Vinh calls upon all the nations that benefit from its life-giving water to observe the "Spirit of the Mekong" in the implementation of all future development projects. To achieve this end, there must be a concerted and sustained commitment to cooperation and sustainability. At this critical cross-roads, we should remind ourselves of the mantra from Sea World San Diego: "Extinction is forever. Endangered means we still have time."

This is not an ordinary book on rainfall and runoff. All the general and working formulas in this book are theoretically derived. The formulas are therefore globally and eternally applicable, as long as the situations under consideration are within the assumptions and limitations of the theory. This epitomises the powerful nature of the physically-based approach in hydrology. This book covers formulas for flow depth; flow velocity; average flow velocity; wave celerity; average wave celerity; time of concentration; rising, equilibrium and falling phases of a hydrograph; forward characteristic; rising, equilibrium and falling phases of water surface profiles; duration of partial equilibrium discharge; and equilibrium detention storage for flow on an overland plane, and flow in nine different channel shapes, which are (i) circular, (ii) parabolic, (iii) rectangular (deep), (iv) rectangular (square), (v) rectangular (wide), (vi) trapezoidal with equal side slopes, (vii) trapezoidal with one side vertical, (viii) triangular, and (ix) vertical curb.

Page Stegner's extensive writings on American history have made him a popular and critical favorite. "Adios Amigos" maintains his high standard. These essays expertly interweave natural history, conservation polemic, ecology, and wilderness adventures on a number of the West's major whitewater rivers. Stegner moves effortlessly from his own experiences on the Colorado, Yampa, Green, San Juan, Dolores, and Missouri rivers to first explorations by historical figures like Lewis and Clark and John Wesley Powell to modern controversies that threaten the continued existence of these special places. From its opening essay, a hilarious, albeit hazardous, journey down the Owyhee River in southeastern Oregon, to its final impeachment of Lake Powell, Stegner's articles are rich in vivid detail, laced with sardonic humor, and always grounded in a passion for the West -- both its heady past and the promise of its future.

Our goal is to serve; realizing that it is their country, their people, their village, but our problem. We will never do for others what they can do for themselves, but will work in a partnership based upon mutual love, grace, and respect.

Dr. Ben Mathes, president, Rivers of the World

Rivers of the World (ROW) is a not-for-profit Christian ministry that targets remote river basins. Our goal is to serve with people who live in these river basins and those we serve determine our projects. We ask them what makes up their greatest challenges and covenant with them to meet and overcome those challenges together.

ROW emphasizes that it is their country, their village, their culture, but our problem. Our goal is to serve in an atmosphere of mutual concern and respect.

ROW projects run the gamut of human, physical and spiritual needs. Academics, research, education and medical/dental concerns go hand-in-hand with church planting, construction, evangelism and Bible distribution.

www.row.org

Religion and the Culture of Print in Modern America explores how a variety of print media - religious tracts, newsletters, cartoons, pamphlets, self-help books, mass-market paperbacks, and editions of the Bible from the King James Version to contemporary Bible-zines - have shaped and been shaped by experiences of faith since the Civil War. Edited by Charles L. Cohen and Paul S. Boyer, whose comprehensive historical essays provide a broad overview to the topic, this book is the first on the history of religious print culture in modern America and a well-timed entry into the increasingly prominent contemporary debate over the role of religion in American public life.

Through quiet meadows, rolling hills, leafy suburbia, industrial sites, and a changing London riverside, Mick Sinclair tracks the Thames from source to sea, documenting internationally-known landmarks such as Tower Bridge and Windsor Castle and revealing lesser known features such as Godstow Abbey, Canvey Island, the Sanford Lasher, and George Orwell's tranquil grave.

Rivers under Siege is a wrenching firsthand account of how human interventions, often well intentioned, have wreaked havoc on West Tennessee's fragile wetlands. For more than a century, farmers and developers tried to tame the rivers as they became clogged with sand and debris, thereby increasing flooding. Building levees and changing the course of the rivers from meandering streams to straight-line channels, developers only made matters worse. Yet the response to failure was always to try to subdue nature, to dig even bigger channels and construct even more levees-an effort that reached its sorry culmination in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' massive West Tennessee Tributaries Project during the 1960s. As a result, the rivers' natural hydrology descended into chaos, devastating the plant and animal ecology of the region's wetlands. Crops and trees died from summer flooding, as much of the land turned into useless, stagnant swamps. The author was one of a small group of state waterfowl managers who saw it all happen, most sadly within the Obion-Forked Deer river system and at Reelfoot Lake. After much trial and error, Johnson and his colleagues in the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency began by the 1980s to abandon their old methods, resorting to management procedures more in line with the natural contours of the floodplains and the natural behavior of rivers. Preaching their new stewardship philosophy to anyone who might listen-their supervisors, duck hunters, conservationists, politicians, federal agencies-they were often ignored. The campaign dragged on for twenty years before an innovative and rational plan came from the Governor's Office and gained wide support. But then, too, that plan fell prey to politics, legal wrangling, self-interest, hardheadedness, and tradition. Yet, despite such heartbreaking setbacks, the author points to hopeful signs that West Tennessee's historic wetlands might yet be recovered for the benefit of all who use them and recognize their vital importance. Jim W. Johnson, now retired, was for many years a lands management biologist with the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. He was responsible for the overall supervision and coordination of thirteen wildlife management areas and refuges, primarily for waterfowl, in northwest Tennessee.

The aim of this book is to give a state-of-the-art presentation of suspended particulate matter (SPM) in lakes, rivers and marine areas, with a focus on the roles that SPM plays in aquatic ecosystems and on modelling. To the best of the author's knowledge, this is the first book of its kind, and this is remarkable because SPM is very important in aquatic sciences. It regulates the transport of all types of water pollutants in dissolved and particulate phases. It regulates water clarity and the depth of the photic zone, and, hence, also primary and secondary production. SPM regulates bacterioplankton production and biomass, and, thus, also mineralization, oxygen consumption and oxygen concentrations. SPM regulates sedimentation and the use of sediments as an historical archive, e.g. of water pollutants. These matters are discussed in this book, which also presents empirical and dynamical models for SPM based on the ecosystem perspective. The aim of these models is to structure existing knowledge on the factors regulating variations among and within aquatic systems of SPM in a rational and quantitative manner. This knowledge is fundamental for an understanding of the function and structure of aquatic systems. This book is intended as a textbook (mainly for Master's and Ph.D. students) in aquatic sciences, but it should also attract a considerable interest from researchers in limnology, marine ecology and environmental sciences, as well as from consultants and administrators interested in management and studies of aquatic systems. Dr. Lars Hkanson (Ph.D. in physical geography 1972, Uppsala University, Sweden) has been a professor in sedimentology (recent processes) at Uppsala University since 1992. He has been Chairman of IAEAs international aquatic program on Validation of Model Predictions (VAMP), 1988-1994, a member of the delegation for the land Foundation for the Future of the Baltic, 1989-1995 and Director of the International Association for Sediment Water Science (IASWS) 1981-1996. He was President of IASWS 1990-93. He is a member of the editorial boards of Environmental Geology and Aquatic Ecosystem Health and Management. He was awarded The Linn and Alfort Prizes for 1979. Dr. Hkanson has published 450 scientific papers and reports, including 13 international textbooks, 21 books/theses in Swedish and 20 contributions in international monographs.

The captains of two boats on the Mississippi River try to bring their ships and passengers to safety after experiencing the worst earthquake to strike the central United States in nearly two hundred years. Their experiences tell of what we can expect along our great waterways when a giant earthquake once again wracks our land. In Book 1, titled Memphis 7.9, you read of the destruction throughout the eastern United States, and especially in the city of Memphis, when a giant earthquake strikes on the New Madrid Fault.

Rivers and streams occupy a fundamental place within the British landscape. They are central and focal features of the natural landscape, helping to shape the very landforms of the country, as well as providing a range of habitats for flora and fauna. Few places in Britain are far from running water, and human society interacts with rivers in a wide range of ways. Most towns and cities grew up on riverbanks, and rivers play a vital role in economic, social and cultural life. They have provided power for industry; water for industrial use and human consumption; rivers have often been used for communication and the transport of goods; and they are sites of leisure and recreation. Most people are attracted to water; and rivers have featured prominently in literature and art over the centuries. Rivers can also pose threats, from flooding or pollution, and therefore have to be managed and regulated. Whereas there are many books which deal with specific aspects of rivers, "Rivers and the British Landscape" provides the first fully integrated analysis of British rivers exploring the physical formation of rivers; the characteristics of environments; analysis of the social, economic and cultural uses and associations of rivers; and examination of the problems of river management. These themes are explored through historical and contemporary examples, with case studies drawn from all parts of Britain. The book is lavishly illustrated and includes an appendix of key facts about British rivers. Written by experts on each aspect of British rivers, "Rivers and the British Landscape" is aimed at anyone with a general interest in rivers and the British landscape. The authors aim to highlight the holistic nature of river environments, and to explore the ways in which physical, economic, cultural and management characteristics interact to create the distinctive personalities of British rivers. It is hoped that material in this volume may help you to view your local river in a new light.

Originally published in 1983, An Ecosystem Approach to Aquatic Ecology is a unique, comprehensive analysis of a lake ecosystem. It summarizes and integrates results from the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study, one of the most extensive long-term studies of a watershed ever undertaken. The Hubbard Brook Ecosystem study produced two widely acclaimed earlier volumes - Biogeochemistry of a forested ecosystem and Pattern and Process in a Forested Ecosystem - about natural and disturbed terrestrial ecosystems in the Hubbard Brook Valley in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. This new volume integrates the ecology and biogeochemistry of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems to describe the interactions of Mirror Lake with its watershed and airshed. This comprehensive work presents an enormous data base and reference listing. As a model study in limnology, it is an essential text-reference for both the student and the practicing researcher.

The size and form of lakes regulate many general transport processes, such as sedimentation, resuspension, diffusion, mixing, burial and outflow. Lakes: Form and Function discusses how much of the variations among lakes in fundamental ecosystem characteristics may be related to lake morphometry, catchment area features, climatological factors and measurement uncertainties. The transport processes regulate many important variables, such as concentrations of phosphorus, suspended particulate matter, pH and color. These variables, in turn, affect primary production, which regulates secondary production, for example of zooplankton and fish. This book discusses such relationships using both empirical data and statistical analyses, and mechanistic principles and models. Researchers and students in limnology, as well as consultants and administrators interested in management and studies of lake systems, will enjoy reading this book. Lars Hakanson received his PhD in Physical Geography from Uppsala University, Sweden. He has written several papers and books related to recent sedimentological processes in lakes, rivers and coastal areas, to mass-balance modelling of radionuclides, nutrients and metals, to aquatic foodweb models and to water pollution.

If you can find philosophy in rivers and trees, rocks and beasts James has done so. Here are the roots of natural philosophy of which sages old and new have spoken. First it is observed and then it is gotten up close to, soon the words come and they are the good blending of that world out there and the poet's voice. But there are times when the blending is so complete that the two become one. James has taken us here. We go with him on the journey and we nod our heads along with him as nature gives up her philosophy when we give up ourselves.

On September 16, 1896, after a period of very stormy wet weather, I saw a great migration of swallows down the Thames. It was a dark, dripping evening, and the thick osier bed on Chiswick Eyot was covered with wet leaf. Between five and six o'clock immense flights of swallows and martins suddenly appeared above the eyot, arriving, not in hundreds, but in thousands and tens of thousands. The air was thick with them, and their numbers increased from minute to minute. Part drifted above, in clouds, twisting round like soot in a smoke-wreath. Thousands kept sweeping just over the tops of the willows, skimming so thickly that the sky-line was almost blotted out for the height of from three to four feet.

The study is about water scarcity, population explosion and the need for a fair and equitable distribution of the Nile water to survive. It is a warning for the 21st century.

This book examines the impacts of radionuclides released from the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (FDNPP) accident on inland aquatic environments. The focus is on the dynamics of radiocesium in inland aquatic environments. The book comprises three parts: migration behavior of radiocesium in river and lake environment, accumulation of radiocesium into organisms in freshwater, and integrated environmental analysis in a lake system and a forest-freshwater system. Many studies on the dynamics of radionuclides have been published after the FDNPP accident, especially of radiocesium (134Cs 137Cs) in land and marine environment. The key features of this book are the new data of freshwater environment including transport of radionuclides in river and lake watershed, and accumulation of radiocesium in freshwater fishes and insects. Another feature of this book is that it summarizes the dataset of a model lake, Lake Akagi-Onuma, from geochemical and biological approaches. Readers will learn the actual dispersion behavior of radionuclides released from the Fukushima accident and their impacts on freshwater environments since the accident in 2011. The book presents valuable information for assessing the impacts of the FDNPP accident on ecosystem and human health, which are also useful in developing countermeasures for similar accidents and environmental contaminations.

This book studies land use change in tropical landscapes, with particular emphasis on the economic processes that influence rates of land degradation and forest clearing. Multidisciplinary contributions draw lessons from a rich, decade-long collection of economic, social and environmental data on the Manupali upland watershed in the southern Philippines. Through this detailed case study the book documents forces leading to land use changes, in particular the potential impacts of institutional evolution and policy reforms, and highlights interrelationships between biological, economic, and social phenomena.